Ivy Compton-Burnett - Two Worlds and Their Ways

“No more confession, is there? If so, leave it unsaid. I do not want to know any more about you. I know you well enough.”

“I have not made any confession. My sin simply found me out. Oliver would say you should pay more attention But other people’s sin may do the same. I am not the culprit this time.”

“The poor children again? Something transpired with this invasion from the schools? I knew we should regret it.”

“This trouble is not theirs. There is a father to a family as well as a mother and children.”

“Well, why speak in riddles, my dear? It does not help.”

“My mind is not clear about my reasons for telling you. I want to be certain of them, before I speak. It is not that I want you to be on my level as a wrong-doer, though that may come into it; and it may not be such a bad thing to have that equality between us. I think it is that I do not want to have any secret from you, even that I know something to your discredit. You said there were no secrets between us, and when this is told, there will not be, on my side. Further than that I cannot know.”

“There is not much you have not known about me, Maria.”

“There may be only this one thing. As I say, I cannot know. Now I am going to speak, Roderick; I am going to speak, my husband. You remember the day when the earring was missed, and all that perplexity ensued. I went away to rest because I was tired, and also for the reason that we know.”

“Yes, I know. How should I not? But nothing else happened on that day, or happened to you.”

“Something happened to us both, Roderick. I was too tired to climb the stairs, and I rested in this room, on the sofa behind those bookcases. And I was awakened by voices, yours and Mrs. Aldom’s. Need I say any more?”

“Why have you said as much? What is the good?”

“Only what I have told you. But I felt I must say it, because some day it would be said, and possibly when harm would be done. To-day it will equalise things between us, and do no more.”

“I picked up your scarf in the hall. Near the door of this room. In a book that would have been a clue. But I am not a man in a book. I am one on a man’s level, as I need not tell you. There is nothing in your stumble that puts you on it, my pretty, that brings you down to it.”

“You have had to remember that I am a woman. Well, now I must remember that you are a man. It might be better for us both to remember that we are both human beings, liable to human error. Being a man and being a woman seem to lead along the same way.”

Sir Roderick laughed.

“I seem to be talking like Oliver. And I would rather be myself.”

“I would rather you were too, though the boy does well in his way. Well I have little to say to you. I was a widower; I had been a married man; it was a simple emotion; it was before you came into my life. There is really no more to say.”

Maria did not dispute this. Her next words were not her stepson’s but her own.

“Are you giving Aldom’s mother enough for the farm? It is not a case for driving a matter hard. There are things to take into account.”

“I am giving all I can afford. And giving too much would carry its own danger.”

“Giving a little more would carry none.”

“I am doing that. She did not fail to ask it,” said Sir Roderick, telling his wife that his romance was of the past. “And I discharged my obligations all those years ago. I had almost forgotten it.”

“And Mrs. Aldom had quite done so. I wonder what else has been forgotten.”

“You are better, my dear. You are more yourself. This burden is off your mind. You no longer feel the sword hanging over you.”

“And neither do you. You must have felt it, since that day. What is your feeling for Aldom now? Has it altered since you knew?”

“It has and it has not,” said Sir Roderick, speaking easily to cover feeling more complex than his wife supposed, and perhaps less deep. “It is difficult to change a feeling that is the growth of years. It keeps raising its head. And I must not show any difference.”

“It is strange to think that you have — that there are three of them in the house.”

“I have had the thought and put it from me. It is a thing that must be done.”

“I had always noticed the eyes. But I did not think anything of it. We do see likenesses between people. And those very blue eyes are not uncommon about here.”

“One of the girls said something of the kind. I heard them talking. She noticed the eyes too.”

“I did feel at first that Aldom should go,” said Maria, answering the implication. “But I found myself forgetting it. As you say, an old feeling returns.”

“He has not less right to be here than he has always had.”

“But surely less reason, in his present character.”

“He can be here in no other.”

“I hope we are doing right, Roderick. If we are doing wrong, we must go on doing it. After all, we are used to it.”

“Maria, we cannot continue to have talks like this. People are about everywhere. Houses hear and see. Could I say a word in my own library without being heard? We hardly know that this one is not finding someone’s ear. Miss Petticoat was present at the revelation today. This first talk must be the last. Have you anything more to say?”

“Only a little more. But more would occur to me as I said it. So perhaps it is better not said. We know the truth about each other, and know there was no excuse for it. And that must be enough.”

“Well, we must leave it there,” said Sir Roderick, “though I think it is rather too much. Magnets are about on all sides to draw our secrets.”

“To think what the children inherit! It will be hard to train them when we feel we should expect so little.”

“They seem already to have come into their heritage,” said Sir Roderick, with a reckless laugh.

“And I do not know how we shall meet Miss Petticott.”

“That also has happened. Though I do not think it should have. It makes me like her less.”

“Something would soon have done that. You were probably unconsciously waiting for it. She did not know what the scene was to be. And when she did, she would have been riveted to the spot. She is only human, though that causes you surprise. We do like people less when they know the worst about us. Their attitude is not so flattering. But she is not to blame. We must not think of parting with her.”

“We cannot think of it. She will not fail us, while we do not fail her. But loyalty is a tender plant, not an everlasting one.”

“How much we know about virtue, when we practise it so little! Well, people get used to anything, though it would not often be to things like this. We will go upstairs and talk to her and the children. They will expect to discuss their day, and the ice must be broken.”

Miss Petticott was reading aloud to her pupils, a scene that recalled another, and Maria fulfilled her resolve to be simply herself.

“Not asleep this time?” she said, her brows contracting in uncertain recollection.

“Why, no, Lady Shelley. We have had too exciting a day. I am sure I have,” said Miss Petticott, flushing as she realised where her words might lead. “It has been nothing but pleasure from beginning to end, as someone said in a book. And the end was as good as the beginning, which can rarely be said. The interest did not flag; it gathered as the moments passed—”

“And how did the host and hostess enjoy it?”

“Very much,” said Clemence, “and so did they all. When you have been at school, you know what a change it is. Sometimes it seemed as if the term would never end.”

“Dear, dear, we did make a mistake,” said Sir Roderick.

“And the boys enjoyed it too,” said Sefton. “More than anything this term. We played at brigands in the park. Bacon was the chief. And, of course, they liked the things to eat.”